Holy Snow!

We've really been piling up the white stuff in the last few weeks.  I feel like I can't really complain when Micah & Becky in Gloucester have half again what we've got, but it's still a lot of snow, and it keeps on coming.  As I write this another storm has been forecast to bring 6-12" inches this weekend (12-20" in Gloucester). It's made for nice skiing conditions, both XC and downhill, whenever it warms up enough to be tolerable outside, and I've been enjoying the local XC ski trails and skiing with Aiden at Mt. Sunapee on Fridays.  I was excited to find that Clark Pond, which is about a mile from our house and where I most often walk Kimball, now has groomed and tracked XC ski trails.  What a gift, to have groomed trails with no fee!  Even Kimball rejoices at this (as she  obliviously steps all over the groomed track-grrr) since she can barely walk in the 3' of uncompacted snow in the forest or our yard.

Kimball is standing up here, believe it or not. 

Last weekend there was one nice "warm" day -28 degrees! And it felt like you didn't even need a jacket! We spent the whole day outside in Hanover at the Occam Pond Party.  This is an annual event that is part of Darmtouth's Winter Carnival, and it was pretty fun.  Aiden and I skated for two hours on Occam Pond, which was a treat since the pond is large and completely cleared of snow.  They had a hamburger bar on the pond that you could skate up to, and Aiden was really excited to try skating while eating a hamburger.  "Mom, I've never done that before!" he said.  Well, hmm.  I am 40 years old and I'd never done it either, so we both decided to try skating with a burger.  Turns out it's easy, and very satisfying.  They also had sleigh rides at the Occam Pond Party (Haley's favorite), a parade, a marshmallow pit, sugar on snow, and ice luges for the kids to slide down.

Indoor activities have been a big part of life, too, these past few weeks.  The kids have been off or delayed from school more than a few days, and we're making up art projects and playing games and watching TV sometimes when it's too nasty to go outside.  We made birds out of socks last weekend (Aiden's idea), and we've had a few playdates with school friends.  And, we went back to the Muse Paintbar for another afternoon of acrylic fun.  We've decided we should really just get some canvases and paints at home since we never seem to want to paint what the instructor is painting anyway.  Aiden made a toucan, Andy an awesome likeness of one of our speckled chickens, and I made an ice princess for Haley. The instructor painted a sailboat in a sunset.  Haley works strictly in pinks, herself.   We're looking forward to escaping all this snow madness for a little while in Islamorada in about a week!

Haley after a recent playdate- was too tired to shop with me...